Midterm 1 Flashcards
1
Q
What is social psychology?
A
The scientific study of the feelings, thoughts, and behaviours of individuals in social situations
2
Q
What did the Milgram study illustrate?
A
The power of authority and the situation on the individual
3
Q
Do disposition not matter?
A
No, they matter in interaction with the situation
4
Q
Who is considered the father of social psychology?
A
Kurt Lewin
5
Q
What is the fundamental attribution error?
A
the tendency to underestimate situational influences on behaviour and to overestimate the influence of personal dispositions
6
Q
Our construals are often ____ and _____
A
Our construals are often automatic and non-conscious
7
Q
Why do our construals feel like reality?
A
Because they are effortless and seamless
8
Q
What is another way of defining social psychology?
A
The scientific attempt to understand and explain how the feelings, thoughts, and behaviours of individuals are influenced by the actual or perceived thoughts, feelings, and behaviours of others
9
Q
What is Hindsight Bias?
A
- Also known as the “I knew it all along” phenomena
- The tendency to overestimate our ability to have foreseen an outcome after learning the outcome
10
Q
What is Confirmation Bias?
A
The tendency to seek out, pay attention to, and believe only evidence that supports what we are already confident we know
11
Q
What’s a theory?
A
an integrated set of related principles that explains and generates predictions about some phenomenon in the world
12
Q
What’s a hypothesis?
A
a testable prediction about what will happen under specific circumstances if the theory is correct
13
Q
What’s data?
A
a set of observations that are gathered to evaluate the hypothesis
14
Q
What are different data-collection methods?
A
- Self-report
- Observation
15
Q
What are different settings of study?
A
- Field
- Laboratory
16
Q
What are different research designs?
A
- Descriptive
- Correlational
- Experiments
17
Q
What’s a measured variable?
A
a variable whose values are simply recorded
18
Q
What’s a manipulated variable?
A
a variable whose values the researcher controls, usually by assigning different participants to different levels of that variable
19
Q
What is the operational definition?
A
the specific way of measuring or manipulating an abstract variable in a particular study
20
Q
What does operationalizing a variable mean?
A
Turning it into a number, which can be recorded and analyzed
21
Q
Describe the self-report method of data-collection
A
People describe themselves and/or their behaviour in an interview or survey, using a rating scale
22
Q
Describe the advantages of the self-report method of data-collection
A
- Easy
- Relatively inexpensive
- May allow us to collect data from more participants, which will make our study stronger
23
Q
Describe the limitations to the self-report method of data-collection
A
- Social Desirability bias
- Difficulty to identify and verbalize experience
- Not always aware of why we do things
- Often relies on retrospective report (recalling memories) which may be inaccurate or biased from current experience
24
Q
What is social desirability bias?
A
the tendency to answer questions in a manner that will be viewed favourably by others
25
Describe the direct observation method of data-collection
Researchers observe and record the occurrence of behaviour
26
Describe the advantages of the observation method of data-collection
- More objective than self-report
- May observe real-world behaviour
27
Describe the limitations of the observation method of data-collection
- More expensive
- More time-consuming
- More difficult
- Probably not able to recruit as many participants
- Needing extensive training to be as objective and consistent as possible during observation
28
What's random sampling?
- a sample in which every person in the population of interest has an equal chance of being included
- This is important because it makes the sample much more representative of the general population
29
Many research findings in social psychology are based on which group of people?
- WEIRD: White, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic people
- These represent people from western societies
30
Why is non-random sampling especially problematic?
When the sample is skewed by interest in the topic or other factors that might strongly affect the outcome
31
What's a scatterplot?
A figure used to represent a correlation
32
What is the correlation coefficient?
- A statistic used to describe the direction and strength of the relationship
- Identified by Pearson's r
- Score closer to 0 = weaker relationship
- Score closer to -1 or +1 = stronger relationship
33
What does it mean when the slope is exactly horizontal on the scatterplot?
It means that there is no correlation between both variables
34
Does correlation = causation?
No, correlations reveal relationships but are not enough to support causal claims
35
What's needed to establish causality?
1. Two variables must be correlated
2. One variable must precede the other
3. There must be no reasonable alternative explanations for the pattern of correlation
- Experimental design fits these criteria which allows us to establish causation through experiments
36
What's the gold standard for establishing causality?
The experiment
37
Describe Kurt Lewin's theory of the Field of Forces
- He believed that the behavior of people, like the behavior of objects, is always a function of the field of forces in which they find themselves
- He believed that the field of force in the case of human behaviour is the situation
38
What's Kurt Lewin's formula for understanding human behaviour?
B = f(P, E)
Where B (behaviour), f (function), P (Person), E (Environment)
39
What are dispositions?
Internal factors, such as beliefs, values, personality traits, and abilities that guide behaviour
40
What are channel factors?
- They help explain why certain circumstances that appear unimportant on the surface have great consequences for behaviour, either facilitating it or blocking it
- Such circumstances can also guide behaviour in a particular direction by making it easier to follow one path rather than another
- Behavioural economists refer to this concept as nudges
Ex: tetanus shot nudge and Get Out the Vote nudge, having to opt-out of retirement fund
41
What is the Gestalt Principle?
The idea that objects are perceived not by means of some passive and unbiased perception of objective reality, but by active, usually non conscious interpretation of what the object represents
42
What's naive realism?
The belief that we see the world directly, without any complicated perceptual or cognitive machinery "doctoring" the data
43
What are construals?
- Construals of situations and behaviour refers to our interpretation of them and to the inferences, often non conscious, that we make about them
- Our perceptions of people affect our perceptions of their actions and will drive our behaviour towards them
44
What are schemas?
- a knowledge structure consisting of any organized body of stored information that is used to help in understanding events
- Used to predict behaviour in social interactions
- Stereotypes are a form of schema we have for people
- Schemas are used to make assumptions about things, situations and people
45
What are automatic processes?
implicit attitudes and beliefs that can't be readily controlled by the conscious mind
46
What are controlled processes?
explicit attitudes and beliefs that we're aware of
47
What's ideomotor mimicry?
When we subconsciously imitate other people's body language
48
What is natural selection?
Characteristics of species change over time in order to enhance the species' ability for reproduction and survival which will pass on these traits in subsequent generations
49
How did evolutionnary pressures affect our need to belong?
- Group living used to contribute to survival, as groups offered better protection and greater success in hunting and foraging
- Acquiring language skills very young (babies brains being "prewired" to language) has been very useful to promoting group living
50
What's theory of mind?
the ability to recognize that other people have beliefs and desires
51
What's the naturalistic fallacy?
The claim that the way things are is the way they should be
52
What's social neuroscience?
- A field that studies the neural underpinnings of social behaviour
- This field has revealed just how social the human brain is
53
What is the nucleus accumbens known as?
The brain's reward circuit. It's rich with dopamine receptors
54
What is familialism?
a social value defined by interpersonal warmth, closeness, and support which is usually found in interdependent cultures
55
How can social psychology improve critical thinking?
Social psychology presents scientific methods in the context of common everyday events. We then learn to apply scientific methods very broadly to daily problems, which allows us to think critically about our daily lives.
56
What's a variable?
Anything that can take on different values
57
Describe what correlational research is
Research that involves measuring 2 or more variables and assessing whether there is a relationship between them
58
Describe what experimental research is
- Research in which one variable is manipulated, and the other is measured.
- This enables researchers to make strong inferences about why a relationship exists or how different situations affect behaviour
- Can establish causation
59
Describe descriptive research
- Often the first step in scientific research
- Serves as "scoping out" the problem or phenomenon
60
What's an independant variable?
the manipulated variable in an experiment
61
What's a dependant variable?
the measured variable in an experiment
62
What's the control group?
- a condition comparable to the experimental condition in every way except that it lacks that one "ingredient" hypothesized to produce the expected effect on the dependent variable
- it's important because by modifying just 1 or 2 factors at a time, the experimenter can pinpoint their influence
63
What are the 3 types of validity?
- Measurement validity
- Internal validity
- External validity
64
What's measurement validity?
- The correlation between a measure and some outcome the measure is supposed to predict
- AKA construct validity
- Are you measuring what you think you're measuring
65
What's internal validity?
- Refers to the likelihood that only the manipulated variable and no other external influence could have produced the results
- Threatened by the presence of confounds
- Can we rule out alternative explanations in an experiment?
66
What's external validity?
- An indication of how well the results of a study generalize to contexts outside the conditions of the laboratory
- Difficult to establish high external and internal validity in the same study: the more we try to control everything the more artificial and further away from the real world everything becomes in our study
67
What's reliability?
- The degree to which a measure gives consistent results on repeated occasions or the degree to which 2 measuring instruments yield the same or very similar results
- Reliability can be tested through test-retest reliability and inter-rater reliability
68
What's the difference between measurement validity and reliability?
A measure could be reliable but that does not mean it is valid
69
What's a confound in research experiments?
an alternative explanation for a relationship between two variables
70
What is statistical significance?
- a measure of the probability that a given result could have occurred by chance alone
- the larger the difference or relationship and the larger the number of cases, the greater the statistical significance
71
What's null hypothesis testing?
Testing to see whether there is no significant difference between two variables
72
What 2 factors are used to determine statistical significance?
1. the size of the difference between groups in an experiment or the size of a relationship between variables in a correlational study
2. the number of cases on which the finding is based (pop or sample size)
73
What's a p-value?
- p-values tell us the probability of getting a result as extreme as the one we observed if there really were no difference between the 2 groups (or no relationship between 2 variables)
- Takes value between 0 and 1
- We use a threshold of .05 for the p-value to determine if something is statistically significant
- P value < .05 reject the null
- P value > .05 do not reject the null
74
What are the factors identifying the size of p-values?
1. The size of the observed effect (larger effects more likely to be statistically significant)
2. The number of participants in the study (more likely to be statistically significant when more participants)
75
What's a replication study?
- A study that repeats a previous study with identical or similar methods but different participants to see if the original finding can be repeated
- There's direct replication (recreating original experiment exactly) and conceptual replication (recapturing the original finding by using different methods or measures)
76
What's the function of the Institutional Review Board?
a committee that examines research proposals and ensures that research complies with provincial, national and international guidelines for ethics in research
77
What are the factors that the IRB consider in their evaluation of research proposals?
- Costs vs Benefits
- Informed consent
- Deception must be justified
- Adequate debriefing
- Confidentiality
78
What's self-concept?
What we know and believe about ourselves
79
What are self-schemas?
Cognitive structures built from past experience that represent people’s beliefs and feelings about themselves, both in general and in particular kinds of situations
- These provide a framework, or template, for processing incoming information
80
What are the sources of self-knowledge?
1. Introspection
2. Inferences from observations of our own behaviour (self-perception theory)
3. Feedback & reactions from others (looking glass self and reflected appraisals)
4. Social comparisons
81
What is the self-perception theory?
Theory that when we're uncertain about our attitudes and feelings, we infer them by observing our own behaviours
82
What is the looking glass self?
How we come to know ourselves through people's reactions to us
83
What are reflected self-appraisals?
A belief about what others think of one's self or our beliefs about other's reactions to us
84
What's the social comparison theory?
The theory of how people come to know themselves by comparing themselves to other people
85
What are the 3 hypotheses for the social comparison theory?
1. We are driven to evaluate our opinions and abilities
2. When objective standards are not available, we engage in social comparisons
3. We tend to engage in comparisons with people who are not too dissimilar
86
What was Morse & Gergen's 1970 study and how does it relate to the social comparison theory
- In the study, there were 2 types of people that the participants encountered (mr clean that looks like he has his life together & mr. dirty who looks disorganized)
- Participants then filled in a self esteem questionnaire
- Shows how humans tend to compare themselves to others, as participants' self-esteem went up when meeting mr. dirty but it went back down when they saw mr. clean
87
What's downward comparison?
- Comparing ourselves with people who are worse off
- Makes us feel good about ourselves
88
What's upward comparison?
- Comparing ourselves with people who are better off
- Usually used when our focus is on improvement
89
What's self esteem?
The positive or negative evaluation a person has of themselves
90
What's trait self esteem?
* Enduring level of self-regard
* Fairly stable
91
What's state self esteem?
* Dynamic, changing feelings about the self
* Vary moment to moment
92
What are the contingencies of the self-worth model?
- People seek to maintain, protect, and enhance self- esteem by attempting to obtain success and avoid failure in domains on which their self-worth has been staked (self-esteem depends on how we feel about these domains of ourselves)
- It hence may be wise to stake our self-worth on a wide range of domains
93
What's the sociometer theory?
- A theory positing that self-esteem is an internal, subjective index of how well we are regarded by others and how likely we are to be included or excluded by them
- High self-esteem indicates that we are thriving in our relationships
- Low self-esteem suggests that we are having interpersonal difficulties
94
How does naive realism relate to self-esteem?
Because with naive realism we have a belief that we see the world as it is and that others see the world as we do, individuals with low self-esteem believe others share their negative self-views
95
What's narcissism?
- Unrealistic and self- aggrandizing views of the self
- Can lead to defensiveness and aggression toward people who threaten their positive self-view
96
What are the motives driving self-evaluation?
- Self-enhancement motivation
- Better-than-average effect
- Self-serving construals
- Self-affirmation theory
- Self-concept clarity
- Self-verification theory
97
What's self-enhancement motivation?
The desire to maintain, increase, or protect positive views of the self
98
What's the better-than-average effect?
The finding that most people think they are above average on various personality trait and ability dimensions
99
What are self-serving construals?
- Most people think of themselves as above average on ambiguous traits (niceness, intelligence), since you can construe these ambiguous traits in multiple ways
- When the domain is constrained to be specific,
better-than-average effect diminishes
- We think of our best selves when asked questions about ourselves and certain domains, rather than think about our average selves and average levels in different domains
100
What's the self-affirmation theory?
- Theory explaining how people can maintain a positive overall sense of self-worth in the face of threats to their self-concept
- Done by affirming valued aspects of oneself unrelated to the threat
101
What's self-concept clarity?
The extent to which one possesses a clearly defined, internally consistent, and temporally stable sense of self
102
What's the self-verification theory?
- Theory that people strive to maintain a coherent self-view because it
serves our need for prediction and control
- this theory predicts that people will seek feedback that reinforces their self-view, even when self-view is negative
103
What are the different self-verification strategies people engage in?
- Developing self-confirmatory environments (how we dress and who we stay friends/roommates with)
- Engaging cognitive strategies that produce the illusion of a self- confirmatory social environment (selective attention to feedback confirming one’s self-view and better recall for self- confirmatory rather than self-discrepant feedback)
104
What's self-regulation?
- Processes by which people initiate, later, and control their behaviour in the pursuit of their goals
- Ability to prioritize long- term goals over immediate rewards
105
What are the different self-regulation strategies people engage in?
- Self-regulating in relation to ideal and ought selves
- Resisting Temptation: Hot vs. Cool Processes
- Implementation-intention
106
What's the self-discrepancy theory?
A theory that behaviour is motivated by standards reflecting ideal and ought selves
107
What's the actual self?
beliefs about what you are actually like
108
What's the ideal self?
beliefs about what we would like to be
109
What's the ought self?
beliefs about what we ought to be
110
Explain what self-regulating in relation to ideal and ought selves entails
- When people regulate their behavior with respect to ideal self standards, they have a promotion focus
- When people regulate their behavior with respect to ought self standards, they have a prevention focus
111
What's the promotion focus?
a focus on attaining positive outcomes
112
What's the prevention focus?
a focus on avoiding negative outcomes
113
Explain what Resisting Temptation: Hot vs. Cool Processes entails
- Hot processes are driven by strong emotions and energize us to pursue rewards
- Cool processes are driven by reasoning and keep us on track as we pursue long-term goals
- ”Cooling down” can help us resist temptation
114
Explain what Implementation-intention entails
It entails an “if-then” plan to engage in a goal-directed behaviour (the “then”) whenever a particular cue is encountered (the “if”)
115
What is self-presentation?
- Presenting the person we would like others to believe we are
- As if we were using social interaction as a dramatic performance
- AKA impression management
116
What does the term face mean in the self-presentation concept?
the public image we want to project
117
What's self-monitoring?
the tendency to
monitor our behaviour to fit the current situation
118
What would being high on the self-monitoring trait look like?
- Similar to chameleons the person will shift their selves according to people they’re with or different social contexts
- This can leave people with the impression that you’re fake
119
What would being low on the self-monitoring trait look like?
Likely to behave more according to their own preferences and values, they won’t shift their behaviour as much across different contexts
120
What's self-handicapping?
- Protecting one’s self- image by engaging in self- defeating behaviours that provide an excuse for later failure
- When we fear failure, we may engage in these behaviours so we can blame the outcome on the external factors rather than our own lack of ability
121
What are independent cultures' self-construals?
- The self is an autonomous entity distinct and separate from other people
- They focus on asserting uniqueness & independence, internal causes of behaviour
- Conception of self as a set of traits stable across time and social context
Ex: “I am adventurous”, “I am smart”, “I am outgoing”
122
What are interdependent cultures' self-construals?
- The self is fundamentally connected to other people
- They focus on social roles, one’s place within community
- Attention to social context & awareness that situations influence behaviour
- Conception of self in terms of social identities, relationships & roles; malleable across situational contexts
Ex: “I am the daughter of Juan & Camila”, “I am a Muslim”, “I am outgoing with my friends”
123
How do independent and interdependent cultures differ in terms of self-esteem?
- Independent cultures place more focus on self-esteem and self-esteem is more personal & less relational
- People from interdependent cultures are more concerned with self-improvement & working toward collective goals
124
What's the overconfidence bias?
The tendency to have greater confidence in our judgments & decisions than our actual accuracy warrants
125
What's the Dunning-Kruger effect?
- people unskilled in a domain lack the metacognitive ability to realize they are incompetent
- AKA the double-curse of incompetence
126
What are the 2 main dimensions along which faces are evaluated according to Todorov and his colleagues?
- Trustworthiness (approach or avoid)
- Dominance (physical strength)
127
What study demonstrated the accuracy of thin slices of behaviour?
Ambady and Rosenthal's study on the thin slices of behaviour showed video clips (2 s – 10 s long) of unfamiliar professors which ended up closely corresponding to ratings of these professors by students at end of semester
128
What are theories that identify how first-hand information about the world can be misleading?
- Self-fulfilling prophecy
- Pluralistic ignorance
129
What's the self-fulfilling prophecy?
- expectations and beliefs that lead to their own fulfillment
- we create the social reality that we expect
130
What are examples of studies done on the self-fulfilling prophecy?
- Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968, study on how identifying students as "late bloomers" affected how teachers treated them
- Behavioural Confirmation (Snyder, 1984) study on men talking to what they believed was either an attractive or unattractive woman on the phone
131
Describe Rosenthal & Jacobson's (1968) study on how identifying students as "late bloomers" affected how teachers treated them
- Students identified as ”late bloomers” on fake diagnostic test performed better two years later
- Teacher expectations led them to behave in ways that fulfilled their expectations
- Teachers expectations positively shaped the student’s experience (gave them more attention, more positive reinforcement, more encouragement)
132
Describe Snyder's (1984) study on men talking to what they believed was either an attractive or unattractive woman on the phone
- Participants spoke on the phone with a woman they believed to be attractive or unattractive
- The woman that was rated as more attractive was rated as warmer and more sociable (due to the men treating the woman with more warmth, humour and friendliness)
- The woman that was rated as less attractive was rated as more cold (due to the men treating the woman with a colder and less friendly or warm attitude)
133
What's pluralistic ignorance?
It occurs when people act in ways that conflict with their private beliefs because they erroneously believe that these beliefs conflict with those of the group
134
How can second-hand information about the world be misleading?
- People may transmit information in a way that furthers their personal or ideological agenda
- Ex: biases in news coverage
135
What are some ways that biases are present in news coverage?
- Emphasis on the negative and the sensational (“if it
bleeds, it leads”)
- Selective reporting
- Leading questions
136
What are framing effects?
- The way information is presented
- Can strongly influence judgments
137
What are the 2 types of framing effects?
- Primacy effect
- Recency effect
138
Describe the primacy effect
In a body of evidence, the initial information presented colours interpretation of subsequent information, thus exerting a disproportionate influence on judgment
139
Describe the recency effect
- In a body of evidence, the last information presented tends to be better remembered, thus exerting a disproportionate influence on judgment
- More likely to observe recency effect when there is a large gap between the two pieces of information
140
What kind of framing effects are a type of “pure” framing effect?
Order effects: primacy and recency effect
141
What's spin framing?
Form of framing that varies the content, not just the order of what is presented. Spin framing will usually use certain terms to get a specific idea across and frame a message accordingly
Ex: a company whose product is of higher quality than competing products will introduce information that frames the consumer’s choice as one of quality
142
What's the difference between positive and negative framing?
- Information framed in negative terms tends to elicit a stronger response
Ex: medical treatment appears more attractive if framed in terms of probability of living vs. probability of dying
143
Describe the construal-level theory?
- Psychologically distant actions and events are thought about in abstract terms (higher-level construal)
- Actions and events that are close at hand are thought about in concrete terms (lower-level construal)
144
What's temporal framing?
We think about actions and events within a particular time perspective (a temporal frame) belonging to the distant past, the present moment, the immediate future, etc
145
How are distant actions/events thought about?
- In abstract terms
- In a bigger picture frame
146
How are closer actions/events thought about?
- In concrete terms
- In closer detail
147
What's the confirmation bias?
The tendency to seek out out evidence that confirms (rather than disconfirms) our preconceptions
148
Name examples of research that have been done on the confirmation bias
- Snyder & Swann, 1978, study on participants checking if someone was introverted or extroverted
- Lord, Ross, & Lepper's study (1979) of murder rates with capital punishment (pro-deterrent vs anti-deterrent information)
149
Describe Snyder & Swann's (1978) study on participants checking if someone was introverted or extroverted
- People chose to ask questions that would confirm whether the person fit the profile, but not those that would disconfirm whether this person fit the profile
- When judging introversion, more likely to ask questions like: “Have you ever felt left out of a social group?”
- When judging extraversion, more likely to ask questions like: “How do you liven up a party?”
150
What's motivated reasoning?
People can be highly motivated to deliberately seek out evidence that confirms what they believe and want to be true
151
What's bottom-up processing?
- "Data-driven" approach
- Takes in relevant stimuli from the outside world which is transformed into a perception
- Receiving information in a passive form
Ex: text on a page, gestures in an interaction, or sound patterns at a cocktail party
152
What's top-down processing?
- “Theory-driven” approach
- Filters and interprets bottom-up stimuli in light of preexisting knowledge and expectations which shapes our perception
- Meaning of stimuli isn't passively recorded but is actively construed
153
What are examples of different types of schemas we have?
- Person schemas
- Event schemas and scripts
154
Describe person schemas
- Contain information about specific individuals
- They can be about appearance, personality, likes, dislikes, behaviours, etc.
155
Describe event schemas and scripts
They let us know what we can expect in given situations and how we should behave
156
What's priming?
- Exposure to stimuli that “activate” or bring to mind a particular schema
- May occur below threshold of awareness (subliminally)
157
What are some examples of primes?
- Words
- Features of the environment
- Cultural symbols
- Bodily sensations
158
What are different areas top-down processing can affect?
- Attention
- Memory
- Construals
- Behaviour
159
How can top-down processing affect attention?
Expectations direct attention on certain things that result in failing to see/notice other things
160
How can top-down processing affect memory?
- In some situations we might remember schema inconsistent information if it’s highly surprising but generally we display schema-consistent memory
- False memories (critical lures): we often see and remember what we expect and not exactly what happened
161
How can top-down processing affect construals?
The schema that is activated influences whether someone is seen positively or negatively
162
How can top-down processing affect behaviour?
Examples:
- Reminders of money lead to more persistence on task and reduced helpfulness towards others (Vohs et al., 2006)
- Reminders of old age lead participants to walk slower (Bargh et al., 1996)
- Religious people subliminally exposed to religion-related words more likely to help others (Shariff et al., 2016)
163
What are the two mental systems that underlie social cognition?
- Intuitive System
- Rational System
164
Describe the Intuitive System
* Quick & automatic
* Little or no effort
* No sense of automatic control
* Carries out operations in parallel
- Can do many things at the same time without being depleted
- Critical for effective interpersonal
judgments
165
Describe the rational system
* Slower & controlled
* Based on rules & deduction
* Subjective experience of agency & concentration
* Performs operations serially
- Can only do operations one at a time (step-by-step)
166
What are heuristics?
Mental “shortcuts” or “rules of thumb” used for making rapid, “good enough” judgments & decisions
167
What's the availability heuristic?
- The more easily we can recall something, the more likely it seems
- Underlying logic: “If examples can be recalled quickly & easily, there must be many of them”
- Objects/events that are frequent in our environment are also frequent in our experience and hence more frequent in our memory
Ex: thinking of New York and LA having highest violent crime rates due to numerous crime tv shows taking place there
168
How can the availability heuristic lead to biased assessments of risk?
Availability heuristic + over-representation of negative, sensationalistic information in the news = skewed assessments of risk
169
How can the availability heuristic lead to overconfidence?
When we think about why an idea might be true, it begins to seem true
170
What's the representative heuristic?
- The tendency to judge likelihood that a target is part of a larger category based on how representative it is of that category
- Underlying assumption: a member of a given category should resemble the category prototype
171
How can the representative heuristic be useful?
Useful if prototype is valid and members of the category cluster around the prototype
172
How can the representative heuristic lead to erroneous judgments?
It can lead us to neglect other useful sources of info such as base-rate information
173
What's base-rate information
Information about the relative frequency of events or members of different categories in a population
174
What study explored base-rate neglect?
Kahneman & Tversky's (1973) study which looked at how participants neglect base rates, basing their estimates entirely on how similar they thought a character was to the typical student in the discipline
175
What's illusory correlation?
- Belief that two variables are correlated when they are not
- Often the result of the availability heuristic + representativeness heuristic
Ex: arthritis and weather
176
What's a causal attribution?
- Linking an event to a cause
Ex: inferring that a personality trait is responsible for a behaviour
- The attributions you make will shape your emotional and behavioural responses
- The attributions you make for your successes and failures will influence your wellbeing & academic success
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Why do we make causal attributions?
- Satisfies our needs for prediction and control
- If we can understand the causes of a
behaviour or an event, we will be better able to make predictions about future behaviour and events
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What's an explanatory style?
A person’s habitual way of explaining events
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What are the 3 dimensions of explanatory style?
* Internal/external
* Stable/unstable
* Global/specific
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Describe the internal/external explanatory style
* Does the cause have something to do with me? (internal attribution)
* Or does the cause have something to do with other people/the circumstances/something in my environment?
(external attribution)
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Describe the stable/unstable explanatory style
* Is the cause permanent/ recurring/long-lasting (stable)?
* Or is the cause the product of specific and temporary circumstances? (unstable)
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Describe the global/specific explanatory style
* Does the cause generalize to other events, in other domains of life?
* Or is it specific to this one event?
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What's a pessimistic explanatory style?
* Tendency to explain negative events in terms of internal, stable, and global causes
- Related to undesirable life outcomes, such as lower grades and poorer physical health later on
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What's learned helplessness?
A state of passive resignation to an aversive situation that one has come to believe is outside of one’s control
Ex: Seligman & Maier's (1967) study on dogs and the electrified floor
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What research findings have been found about controllability attributions?
* Controllability attributions are a strong predictor of depression (demonstrated by a study by Craig et al., 1991)
* Interventions that foster more adaptive attributional tendencies for academic outcomes have positive effects on subsequent performance (demonstrated by a study by Dweck, 1975)
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What did the study by Dweck (1986) on Gender Differences In Attributions About Controllability find?
- Boys are more likely to attribute failures to lack of effort
- Girls are more likely to attribute their failures to lack of ability
- Stems, in part, from feedback boys and girls receive from teachers
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What's the covariation principle (Kelley, 1967)?
- When behaviour is attributed to potential causes that occur at the same time
- Useful when multiple opportunities for observation are available
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What are the 3 types of covariation information that are used for causal attributions?
* Consensus
* Distinctiveness
* Consistency
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Explain the consensus type of covariation information
- Refers to what most people would do in a given situation
- High consensus: more people do this (suggests something about the situation)
- Low consensus: no one else does this (suggests something about the person)
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Explain the distinctiveness type of covariation information
- Refers to what an individual does in different situations
- High distinctiveness: behaviour is unique to this particular situation (says more about the situation)
- Low distinctiveness: behaviour is not unique to this particular situation (says more about the person)
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Explain the consistency type of covariation information
- Refers to what an individual does in a given situation on different occasions
- High consistency: the person does this all the time (says something about the person)
- Low consistency: the person rarely/never does this (says something about the situation)
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What are the criteria for dispositional attributions?
* Low consensus
* Low distinctiveness
* High consistency
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What are the criteria for situational attributions?
* High consensus
* High distinctiveness
* High consistency
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What's the discounting principle (Kelley, 1973)?
Tendency to assign less weight to a particular cause of behaviour if other potential causes are present
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What's the augmentation principle?
Tendency to assign greater weight to a particular cause of behaviour if other potential causes are present that would normally produce a different outcome
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What's the Self-Serving Attributional Bias?
Inclination to make situational attributions for one’s failures, but dispositional attributions for one’s successes
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What are some examples of studies that explored the Fundamental Attribution Error?
- Study by Jones & Harris (1967) where participants read pro-Castro or anti-Castro essays written by another student and had the task to rate how pro-Castro the student writer really is. Even when told what to do (no control), their essays were still considered as dispositions about the writers
- Study by Gilbert & Jones (1986) where participants who listened to a student read political statements written by someone else rated the student’s political affiliation in line with the statement, even when the statement was written by the participant themselves
- Study by Ross, Amabile, & Steinmetz (1977), where participants were divided into “questioners” and “answerers” and questioners generate the trivia questions based on their knowledge; everyone is aware of this but questioners rated as more intelligent by answerers and outside observers
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What are cultural differences in the fundamental attribution error?
- The fundamental attribution error is more widespread and pronounced for Westerners than for Easterners
- Westerners pay little attention to situational factors in circumstances in which Asians pay considerable attention to them and grant their influence
- Asians might also be less likely to make a dispositional inference in the first place.
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What are some causes of the Fundamental Attribution Error?
- Motivational influences (just-world hypothesis - motivation to feel secure)
- Perceptual salience
- Automatic vs. Effortful Cognition
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What's the just-world hypothesis?
belief that people get what they deserve in life and deserve what they get
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Describe the Actor-Observer Difference?
- The degree to which you are oriented towards the person vs. the situation depends on whether you’re engaged in the action yourself (actor) or if you’re just observing someone else (observer)
- As actor, more interested in the situation you’re dealing with and more likely to make situational attributions
- As observer, more interested in the person you’re dealing with and more likely to make dispositional attributions
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What are causes for the Actor-Observer Difference?
- Interpreting the question differently
- Perceptual salience
- Different access to information
- Intentions
- Typicality (in better position to know if a behaviour is distinctive)
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What are the steps to the scientific method?
1. making observations
2. Coming up with a theory
3. Forming a hypothesis
4. Testing the hypothesis with a research method
5. Analyze data
6. Report results & further inquiry
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What's the difference between a mediator and a moderator?
- The mediator has to be the causal result of the independent variable
- The moderator must not be the causal result of the independent variable
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What did Chaiken & Baldwin's study (1981) demonstrate?
Participants with weak attitudes engaged in self-perception processes
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How can the availability heuristic lead to biased perceptions of contributions to joint projects?
- People tend to overestimate their own contributions to group projects
- We devote a lot of energy and attention to our own contributions, so they should be more available than the contributions of everyone else
